Roon 2.0 Launched Today - Adds Mobile Listening

[Dennis_FL]

Warning: The following is a useless rant.

Every now and then, I think I should get a Roon lifetime license.
And every time, I find it too expensive.
Then I make up my mind and come back to it, eventually willing to jump the step...
To discover that the price increased ridiculously.

I like Roon idea, but hate you need a dedicated server running 24/7 for it.

I also hate subscription fee-based licenses.

I'd be ready to invest in Roon at $500 for a lifetime license. Maybe $600.
But then it became $700.
But now it's $830.

No way.

And since that will lead me nowhere, I'll stop my subscription.

And the Roon yearly subscription price increase quite a bit as well (~$150/yr) after they came out with the mobile ARC or a 5-6 year payback on the lifetime . That got my attention and I started to dust off JRiver again (I have a Plex lifetime but it skips over my DSD albums).

I really like the simplicity of Roon, especially with the user interface for albums, DSP, audio end points, and album information text. But you're right, I think the cost is getting out of hand. Especially when combined with Qobuz or Tidal costs.

I was asking myself why not just use the $30 JRiver? I lose the integration with Tidal. I lose the simplicity of Roon. I end up spending a Saturday trying to figure out how to do something in JRiver. But I save a ton of money.

 

[Dennis_FL]

i can confirm it works perfectly with ropieee.

Yes, with DLNA? I originally had Ropieee and changed to the XL version. So nice. I sent the Ropieee programmer some money.

 

[JoachimStrobel]

A lot of professional software I use has a price tag and a maintenance fee. That is the way Roon should go, should have gone. Like 500 USD flat and 10% license fee. I can not see any mechanism how the can ran on a fix cost system only - unless they invest the money in something insanely profitably. But then they should switch the business.

 

[Rja4000]

I can not see any mechanism how the can ran on a fix cost system only

By providing improved functionalities that user would want to pay for ?

 

[JoachimStrobel]

By providing improved functionalities that user would want to pay for ?

You mean paying development upfront and hoping that users buy in? Better: charge an annual maintenance fee and provide updates und new functions yearly.

 

[Booker]

I have been using ARC since its release. Now with EQ via MUSE, according to autoeq.app for the AirPods Pro.
Yesterday I switched from iPhone 7 to 14. I was not thinking about any SQ improvement it might cause.

But is it possible to get better SQ by having a better CPU? Because I get that feeling almost immediately when I start playing.